Taking Hebron

The LORD is my light and my salvation; Whom shall I fear? The LORD is the strength of my life; Of whom shall I be afraid? Psalm 27:1 In 2016 my sister attended our city's Citizen's Police Academy. As a part of this 13 week class to educate citizens about the inner workings of the police was the opportunity to go on a 4 hour ride-along with an on-duty police officer. The stories my sister came home with about her ride were fascinating, but I knew I personally would never want to go on a ride. Who would want to ride around town with someone whose job is to confront bad guys? That doesn't seem very safe. But I had nothing to worry about because I wasn't going to ever get that opportunity anyway... right? In the winter of 2016 I started writing the first book in my new series The Life of Laramie McCreedy , and since it was greatly inspired by the life of one of the police officer's Betsy had met at academy I wanted to use this series to advocate for ...

The other day I went out to run some errands, and I forgot to bring a snack. The Lord suggested I get a bagel at Panera when I was in the area. That sounded like a good idea, until I got to the store close to there and it was already after 3 pm. My trip was getting long and to stop and eat a bagel was only going to make it longer. But the Lord was in one of those romantic moods, and He came in with that charming smile and drawing words. Come on, get the bagel, My treat.  Well if You really want to, okay. I walked over and got my bagel, before settling myself at a table outside for it was a beautiful day. As I ate, I observed the people at the three other tables. Each group was very different from the other, yet they all had something in common, they were hungry. And I don't mean hungry for food, like the bagel I was eating, they were hungry for deeper fulfillment. On the far end there was a young lady with some friends. She knew she was physically attractive and she held ...

This post is dedicated to all of my young adult friends. You're embarking on this exciting adventure of adulthood and I humbly pray I can be an encouraging example to you. Several weeks ago I was discussing, via email, my books latest police scene with Police Sgt. Joel. In conclusion to our discussion of options and tactics for this particular situation he said: "Remember, we always have time and resources on our side." My first thought after reading this line was, really?!  I've only been studying policing for about a year now, and as a relatively new "fictional" cop, I tend to get caught up in the urgency of the moment. I agonize over those couple of minutes I have to wait for backup and though I don't want my officers to take unnecessary risks the temptation to send them in prematurely is certainly there!  When you're in your early years of adulthood there's a similar tendency to urgency. There's this pressure we unk...